Editorial Board

As administrators choose Dean McGee’s successor, it is imperative that they find a replacement who understands GS’ institutional mission so that the school remains attractive to future nontraditional students.

The changes made to this year’s FaCU process are welcome ones, but the hurdles that remain are ill-conceived. Come what may, the councils should let students draw their own conclusions from the deliberations, rather than try to manage public perceptions. Transparency should be a tool rather than a threat to student leaders, who, if they are making fair decisions, should have no objection to unqualified public scrutiny.

Students have long complained about the University's meal plans, and with good reason. At the end of each year, students are reduced to swinging by the dining hall whenever they can in hopes of getting their money's worth. If the Columbia and Barnard Dining Services make their meal plans less rigid, no student will feel pressured to run to John Jay for only an apple or a drink.

Students often have difficulty deciding where to enter calculus and language sequences, or whether to skip introductory courses with whose material they are already familiar. The University’s departments should offer online placement tests so students are better equipped to make these decisions.

This past week, Barnard College students received the exciting news that Mayor Michael Bloomberg will be delivering the keynote address at Barnard’s Commencement on May 20. Though some might be surprised by the mayor’s selection, Bloomberg is a fine choice of whom Barnard is rightly proud.

After spending decades in the shadow of spring 1968, when weeklong student demonstrations brought Columbia to a standstill, the University is moving into another era of its history. The passage of the protests’ fortieth anniversary should remind Columbia of the hard lessons it learned—chief among them, the need to guard against divisions strong enough to tear the campus apart. But the anniversary should bring an element of closure to a sequence of events whose legacy is fiercely contested even today.

Beginning tonight, many on campus are observing the 40th anniversary of the now-legendary week of protests against the Columbia administration. Whereas the more nuanced of the scheduled gatherings aim to provide valuable historical perspective, events commemorating the protesters might succumb to the assumption that 1968 had only positive effects on balance. Those in attendance should work to appreciate the complexity of the historical consequences of spring 1968.

While Bacchanal’s April 21 spring concert has been hailed by many students as an improvement over those of previous years, the event’s small crowd and haphazard ticketing methods testify to disorganization and poor advertising on the part of its planners. Bacchanal should redouble its efforts to generate excitement and spirit among the student population through more ambitious and better publicized programming beyond the annual concert.

On April 15, Lehman Lawn was abuzz with music, barbecue, and even fireworks as Barnard students celebrated their annual Spirit Day. Columbia, on the other hand, does not have its own Spirit Day—this is both a symptom and a cause of the palpable lack of community on campus.

Columbia should dissuade its students from entrusting their belongings to the self-proclaimed “very best in collegiate shipping and storage.” What’s more, it should keep Collegeboxes off of College Walk.

That Columbia is strapped for space is an accepted fact of student life. But that Columbia's current system for booking student space is rife with inefficiencies is a matter that can and should be addressed. The University should centralize the process for reserving space, expand pre-calendaring, and penalize groups that fail to utilize reserved spaces to blunt the edge of the space crunch.

With two undergraduate council executive-board elections completed and two more to go, students are witnessing the peak of the campaign season. To curb such student apathy, the councils should revise the campaign schedule and engage the student body early and often to underscore why student government matters. They must further act to effectively end the favoritism some outgoing council leaders seem to extend to their preferred candidate.

With student-council elections in full swing, University Senate races can all too easily pass unnoticed. Many students know little about the purpose and activities of the senate, let alone the candidates running for office. To keep the University better informed about what it does, and to keep abreast of University opinion, the senate should restructure its Web site and seek out regular input from students and faculty.

As is often the case, the two parties campaigning for this year's Columbia College Student Council Executive Board elections propose similar platforms with only minor differences. That leaves leadership style as the key decisive factor for voters casting their ballots beginning Wednesday. Experience Columbia has advanced innovative policy proposals and exhibits a good relationship with the student body. But Connect Columbia is better suited to take the helm of CCSC, thanks to its disciplined ticket, its interest in coalition-building, and its familiarity with the mechanics of the council.

The General Studies Student Council’s elections have assumed special significance in the wake of former GSSC President Niko Cunningham’s drama-filled impeachment and removal from office. Though each of the four candidates running for student body president brings unique strengths to the table, we believe that Brody Berg is best positioned to deliver what GS needs.

Students sometimes feel apathy toward student council and its role on campus. Nonetheless, the new SGA board is inheriting a record of success, and we have every reason to hope it will live up to students’ expectations.

As stress mounts for students filing individual tax returns by the April 15 deadline, the lack of financial guidance available to University undergraduates is painfully evident. The complexity of the income-tax system, coupled with such dangers as identity theft, warrants a program to prepare students for the financial hurdles of the real world.

Dissatisfaction with the overall state of heating and cooling on campus is ubiquitous. Alongside immediate efforts to reduce response times across the board, Columbia University Facilities should invest in better infrastructure for buildings that lack modern heating systems and temperature-control mechanisms.

The University should expand its international summer options and scale up sources of funding for students who need it to make a summer abroad feasible.

Columbia claims to be a “global university,” but its excessively stringent requirements often discourage its students from studying abroad. If the University is serious about creating a new generation of global citizens, it should help them clear the hurdles.

The University is a vast, at times disconnected complex of institutions and communities, but what transpired Friday night can be said simply: We’ve lost one of our own.

CCE has made great strides in diversifying its events and broadening alumni connections, but both students and CCE should work to bridge this perception gap, which dissuades students from seeking help when they need it.

Drop dates should be tied to—and uniform within—individual classes so that students from different schools cannot drop the same class at different times.

As Faculty House prepares to close on April 11 for extensive renovations, the University should be doing more to help its displaced employees find better work, whether on- or off-campus.

Off-campus Flex has been a long time coming. Those involved should be commended for finally making it happen, but they cannot lose sight of the work still needed to perfect the system in the months ahead.

The complex relationships among the University’s four undergraduate schools have long been a source of both benefits and misunderstandings.

Because of the unanticipated time required to complete the new registration procedure, some students were left scrambling to register for housing by the deadline. Housing should have better informed students about the new registration process.

For the past two years, Columbia College students have been in an uproar over their Class Day speakers. Whether one judges by the protests over Senator John McCain’s politics or the general skepticism over the credentials of actor Matthew Fox, it is clear that the annual selection is no stranger to controversy. This year’s choice, however, may only be met with indifference.

The Athletic Department should highlight the successes of lesser-known teams.

Despite recent revelations of Paterson’s extramarital affairs and the possible misuse of campaign funds, the public’s support for the new governor testifies to its desire for a return to normalcy. Paterson must capitalize on his experience and positive reception to tackle his first major tests as governor.

Though reforms are under way, Frontiers still falls short of providing first-year students with a foundational understanding of scientific thinking.

Though Columbia’s announcement regretfully received little media attention in the wake of New York Governor Eliot Spitzer’s lurid scandal, it promises real benefits for students who rely on financial aid.

The University should mandate that professors use CourseWorks so as to standardize online information-sharing for its courses and improve students’ overall academic experience.

Barnard College is currently hosting both the faculty-led Eating Disorders Awareness Week and the student-led Love Your Body Week, each designed to educate students about the dangers of eating disorders. The students and administrators who organized these events should be commended for keeping eating disorders in the public eye, with the hope that they will work together more closely in the future.

Though some residents of Columbia’s Living Learning Center appreciate its efforts to unite students of myriad backgrounds, the center disserves incoming students who are placed there involuntarily. The administration should consolidate the center into a single building and convert the other dormitory into suite-style housing for upperclassmen.

This past Sunday, the Columbia College Student Council held a meeting to propose banning the Web site juicycampus.com from Columbia’s server. CCSC committed an egregious error in proposing action on a matter so clearly out of its purview and demonstrated bad judgment in its overall treatment of the issue.

The Barnard administration, led by the Committee on Instruction, should make certain that sustained student interest in an ethnic studies program and adequate institutional resources form the backing for any eventual course of study.

Although CUIT takes pains to back up and secure all student data that resides on CUIT servers, iit has not made its logging and data-storage policies explicit . CUIT should clearly explain its data backup policies on its Web site so students can be comfortable that their data and e-mails are secure.

Last week, Teachers College announced that professor Constantine had plagiarized the works of others. Surprisingly, the college has indicated that, though Constantine faces official sanctions, she will be allowed to keep her job. To impress upon students and faculty the gravity of Constantine’s actions, and to live up to its stated commitment to academic integrity, TC must explain its reasoning.

At a Community Board 9 meeting on Feb. 21, the City College of New York presented plans for a proposed extension of its research facilities in West Harlem. The presentation evoked memories of the long process by which Columbia University sought feedback from local residents and businesses in the lead-up to its own expansion plan.

The newly created committee to evaluate the Dean's Discipline Process should call for the hiring of advocates for students facing disciplinary action. Without advocates, students can easily get lost in the cryptic complexities of Dean’s Discipline.

The Office of Residential Life and Housing should stagger room selection over a longer time period and make the entire system electronic. These simple measures would streamline what is often a frustrating process.

The University affords excellent housing options, but because housing dictates the quality of life for many students, the period from early March to mid-April is a source of considerable stress.

Although reciprocal access is a sensitive issue for some who fear issues of security or liability, universal swipe access must be genuinely addressed by the undergraduate student councils.

Before long, Columbia students will once again undergo the familiar ritual of midterms—and the perennial problem of finding a decent place to work.

Next Monday, the Interfraternity Council is expected to vote on a proposal to change the regulations affecting fraternity and sorority parties on campus. The University should implement this proposed measure as a practical means of ensuring responsible behavior at Greek parties.

In all but a few circumstances, Columbia College prohibits students from receiving academic credit for summer courses taken at other universities, making it unnecessarily difficult for students who wish to intern or spend their summers outside of New York City. The college should make it easier for students to receive credit for such classes, so long as their planned courses of study have been approved by the Center for Student Advising and the relevant Columbia departments.

The staff editorials that appear daily in these pages frequently call for greater openness and transparency on the part of the University’s administration. Yet feedback from our readers has convinced us that we ourselves have not been transparent, and most students know little of how these editorials are written.

Starting summer 2008, smoking will be banned in all Columbia residence halls. Though this new policy addresses many students’ concerns, the University must be wary of the effect this policy will have on the entrances to large dorms where smokers will most likely now congregate.

Employees of the University often face long delays between starting new jobs and receiving their first paychecks. Columbia University’s Human Resources department has been trying for years to minimize these delays through the use of better computer technology, but it has ignored many problems surrounding the hiring process. Technological improvements should be accompanied by structural reforms that simplify the payment procedures.

Despite the fact that Columbia is a world-renowned and cutting-edge research institution, students and faculty lack access to a useful and mainstream technology that is often considered an educational necessity—a campuswide wireless network. The current network is inadequate, and the University should enact a plan to improve wireless access on campus.

In a late January memo to the University Senate, Housing Policy Committee co-chairs Paige Lampkin and Craig Schwalbe brought the issue of housing for students in the School of General Studies before the Senate with the support of University President Lee Bollinger. While in many ways GS is a separate program with its own particular issues, adequate shelter is not a luxury—it is a basic need for all.

While it may be true that the city is becoming increasingly stringent in its inspections, John Jay should maintain levels of safety and quality high enough to avoid even minor infractions—both to protect students’ safety and to retain their confidence.

Students enjoy the urban studies program both for its fresh, diverse curriculum and for its accessible faculty and staff. But by denying tenure to the program’s director, the final deciding committee imperiled an institution in which the University should—and does—take great pride. This unfortunate decision cannot be revisited, but in its wake the University must ensure that the urban studies program sees continued success.

Columbia has every reason to be proud of its environmental awareness, but it must instill that awareness in students and faculty if the University is truly to go green.

A new policy will require the on-duty RA to remain within a 10-minute walk of his or her residence hall during the day, in addition to the current policy which requires them to be inside their residence halls during nighttime hours. While this directive seeks to provide students with someone to turn to in moments of crisis, it will do little to make students feel more secure. Instead, the focus of future policy changes should be on cultivating closer ties between RAs and the residents to whom they are assigned.

New York magazine recently touted the steps leading to Low Library as a peaceful refuge from the chaos of New York City. For a handicapped visitor to Columbia, however, those steps can be a source of frustration and anxiety. Since Low Library stands astride the north-south campus divide, the University should make it an easy obstacle to overcome.

This Tuesday, Feb. 5, Democratic and Republican voters head to the polls for presidential primaries across the country. Unlike newspapers at our peer institutions, we have consciously declined to endorse a candidate in favor of a broader message: Now, more than ever, it is time for Columbia students to exercise their right to vote.

Operating seven days a week on and in the vicinity of campus, the escort service is a valuable resource that has been greatly improved in the past few years. Nonetheless, persistent logistical flaws limit the service's ability to protect those students who count on it.

Although the Department of Public Safety successfully maintains a secure environment for the Columbia community, there needs to be a more effective system by which students are notified of crime in the area.

As President Judith Shapiro’s 14-year tenure comes to an end, Barnard College’s new president has a unique opportunity to shape the course of the college’s history. In the coming months, Debora Spar will have to find her identity at Barnard and, in so doing, help Barnard better define its own.

By welcoming ROTC back to campus, Columbia has the opportunity to gain a more diverse student body and an improved connection to national issues. At the same time, the University can take a stronger stance against DADT by actively engaging with the military.

CUArts' new box office should epitomize its stated mission of encouraging the arts on campus and making city art and culture more accessible to students. Nonetheless, the development of the box office was not without controversy, and CUArts must bear student concerns in mind as it builds on its recent successes.

University President Lee Bollinger has said that the University cannot afford to expand its financial offerings at present. That may be true, but it is high time for the administration to articulate how it intends to reform financial aid.

Students often do not find out if they are in seminars until after preregistration is closed, or even until the classes are under way, and must reorganize their schedules as a result. Columbia’s undergraduate schools should implement standardized procedures to simplify seminar registration.

Requiring professors to post their syllabi online prior to the start of classes is a quick and simple way to address student concerns over a myriad of issues, including the effectiveness of preregistration, the cost of books, and the difficulty of transferring credit.

Over the past several months, the Columbia community has been sorely divided by repeated crises and their lingering fallout. Insofar as these events elicited heated student and faculty disagreements about proper administrative responses, some degree of tension was unavoidable.

Making Columbia's funding infrastructure more accessible and reasonable will help students understand how the people doling out money reached their decisions.

This semester has seen its share of particularly divisive figures visiting campus. Unfortunately, the administration has overlooked a potential unifying factor, and one that worked well: the Artist in Residence Program.

The University takes pride in its ability to distinguish its top students, but it does a disservice to those who just miss the cut.

SEAS students face many of the same pressures as Columbia College students and should be allowed the same opportunity to leave for a semester.

To afford a broader range of undergraduates access to alumni with relevant professional experience, academic departments should implement their own mentoring programs tailored to those students sidelined by CCE.

Although the University has effectively won the bureaucratic battle for expansion, the administration should remember that they have yet to convince many students and neighborhood residents that their proposal is a sound and ethical one for the community.

At a school that claims to be a close-knit college in the middle of a large University, this lack of intimacy is troubling. Especially in the aftermath of such a divisive semester, Columbia College needs a leader who engenders unity and pride.

There are far too few opportunities in the calendar for students to congregate for a shared purpose, especially in the exam-laden holiday season. At an institution better known for its fissures than its school spirit, these ceremonies are a refreshing chance to celebrate the holidays together and catch a glimpse, however brief, of the elusive Columbia community.

The vast majority of Columbia students consider hate crimes and bias incidents reprehensible, regardless of whether we express these views in a public forum. But by creating an artificial division between students who choose to participate and those who choose not to, the Day Out Against Hate obscures the broad consensus against hate that already exists on campus.

Although the only real way to ensure cheap birth control for all students is to address the effects of the 2005 DRA through further legislation, Columbia and Barnard College Health Services should be granted the resources to ensure that stockpiles are maintained in the interim.

As humanitarian student organizations serve an important purpose in the community and exemplify Columbia’s mission as a global university, it is essential that they be fully funded and supported under the Student Governing Board.

O great ethereal, non-religious, potentially non-existent maker and creator, on this third Thursday of the month of November, so proclaimed to be our day of thanks by the almighty government of the United States of America, a holiday recreationally made in honor of starving Pilgrims at the mercy of Native American gourmands, we raise our voices and give thanks for the bountiful goodness this year has brought.

A move to unify the undergraduate experience and integrate the administrations of General Studies and Columbia College would be a smart one, but the differing needs of students—both curricular and logistical—should not be ignored if such a proposal is enacted.

The University must give the Office of Scholars and Fellows the support it needs to aggressively recruit and effectively advise students who would make strong candidates for high-profile scholarships.

Now that the strikers and their supporters have gained the administration’s ear, they ought to cease their confrontational course that risks alienating their fellow students and pursue avenues of negotiation that adequately represent the opinions of all students.

The University must reaffirm that while the marketplace of ideas may expose professors to criticism, the intrusion of non-academic pressure on the tenure process is unacceptable.

If nothing else, the past week has brought into high relief the need to improve channels of communication between the student body and the administration.

Every student should graduate from Columbia College having thought critically about the ways race, class, and gender affect the human experience both in Western civilization and throughout the world.

While a professor's deciding to join the hunger strike is a bold move that will surely get the attention of the administration, teachers should look for sustainable ways to express their solidarity in the classroom and on an academic level.

As the sun set over the Hudson Wednesday evening, five students—just hours into their much-publicized hunger strike—camped on Low Plaza, demonstrating against the many iniquities and injustices that they say afflict the University.

Because traveling is time consuming, tickets are expensive, and time at home with loved ones seems unfairly short, Columbia should consider extending Thanksgiving holiday to a full week in order to give students a substantial vacation that warrants a pricey airline ticket home.

Over the next few weeks, students and the University's administration must decide whether they are willing to lay out concrete, actionable expectations. Otherwise, the Community Principles Initiative will be little more than a running joke.

The fact that Columbia's new text messaging system is limited only to Columbia affiliates is troubling, as it excludes students’ family members and neighbors who are so often affected by what occurs on and around campus.

With its Community Principles Initiative, Columbia missed what could have been an exciting and important opportunity to involve students from all four schools in crafting ideals that could be followed for years to come.

Columbia's disciplinary procedures have been long criticized as arbitrary, opaque, and unjust. Dean's Discipline—the procedure by which Columbia tries students who are accused of violating most University policies—is long overdue for an overhaul, and should be replaced with a new system that respects students' rights.

Three recent staff vacancies in the Barnard branch of the Higher Education Opportunity Program present the school with a critical challenge: to build on the program's substantial successes without compromising the sense of community it has fostered.

Much of the student body remains unaware of any of the plans for the Northwest Science Building, or how construction will affect their lives in the meantime.

Unless you've been living under a rock, or one of the many pieces of brick that have fallen off Sulzberger Tower during Barnard's unending "facade repairs," you're probably aware that Barnard is building the Nexus.

With the fall proving to be another season of mediocrity for Columbia’s sports teams, it seems strange that the athletic department would choose this time to launch an ambitious capital campaign.

Distributing 24,000 new ID cards in less than a month is no easy task, and students and administrators should look to the distribution process as a fine example of a large-scale operation that did not strangle itself in red tape and employ a similar spirit of efficiency in the coming project to extend Flex into the community.

In an effort to establish a culture that promotes academic integrity, Columbia should establish a board of peers, similar to Barnard's Honor Board, which will review cases of academic dishonesty.

“Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week” purports to examine a link between Islam, institutionalized violence, and oppression, but its organizers dangerously (if unsurprisingly) conflate extremists who practice Islam with the faith itself—a fallacy sure to negate any potential worth in such a discussion.

Columbia must focus more effort on cultivating an international community that is socioeconomically diverse and expanding support for foreign students once they arrive on campus, giving them better access to financial aid and housing.